The Valves play a wedding

Willies, for the last time

Willie's Pasta Grille is closing it's doors forever and becoming a convenience store This sucks big wet warm ones because Willie's was one of the few remaining clubs close to home where we could fit, both stylistically and physically. So, here are a few shots, mostly taken by Greg, that document our last appearance there.

	Greg began the evening by getting nicely toasted, and toasted he remained. He let various strangers use his camera occasionally, hence the picture of himself here. Getting it back proved more difficult and on several occasions has resulted in violent games of Rock Paper Scissors to get it back.

John often warms up for performances by playing instruments he, well, doesn't actually play. I have a similar ritual where I warm up my voice by watching consecutive episodes of Spongebob Squarepants. The guitar (a 69 Telecaster)belongs to Bob Cooney who doesn't play in a band and still manages to have better equipment than Mike does despite playing for more than 30 years.
	The newest addition to the Valves miasma, Brooks our new organist takes his cue from Greg and Mike and starts gettin' liquored up good and early. This was his first gig with us and he played his little white ass off despite having had about 14 minutes total time to learn the material. Despite what other's have said, he is not named for the pharmacy though apparently it is true that he's not allowed inside a CVS.
	Once the alcohol took effect, he was truly one with the rest of the band and began noodling most effectively. Brooks plays in several bands, including Gutta, and Morris Fader. Ah, to be young and have hair again, those were the days.
	Michael "I started wearing hats full time a year ago because I like it and not because I'm losing my hair" Ladd attempts to smash the camera with his guitar while wearing a sardonic grin. Mike was still dabbling in his "I wanna look like a French Impressionist" phase at the time. Sadly, not long after this gig, he did some research and discovered that French Impressionists are not french people who do impressions of celebrities like Bill Cosby and Jack Benney and lost interest.
	Greg, the electrical engineer with the PHD apparently forgot to check to see if his guitar was properly grounded before grabbing a knob. The curious device on the side of the mic stand is to hold his harmonica mic, it is NOT a direct tap to a keg he keeps under the bar.

John, looking oh-so rock & roll as he tries to keep up with the much younger Brooks, who's finger dexterity is easily the level of Marylin Chambers in her prime. John's fingers more accurately resemble those of Sylvester Stallone's at the end of Rocky

Tommy brought the Chia Pimp hat. Ironically, Tom's hair more often resembles a chia pet in all ways but the little leaves, but here he goes for the full Leprechaun Pimp look.

But he wasn't the only one to go full pimpin. I look a little like Marlon Brando under a trio of tahitian hookers. I am extremely color coordinated however, you can't take that from me.
	Tommy rips it up. Tom is easily the hardest working member of the Valves, pouring his heart and soul into every song. He also pours sweat, a lot of it. I sweat a lot too, but I'm the size of a buick, Tom's sweat comes the old fashioned way, bad hygiene and an allergic reaction to deodorant. But seriously folks, without Tom's ecstatic drumming, we'd be a 10 piece band. The most amazing thing about this picture is that he's wearing a shirt that can't be used to alert fogbound ships of shallow reefs ahead.
	Jay, our sometime soundman took the stage to rock out on a song we didn't know. Fortunately, we're professionals and were able to play along as if we had heard the song twice before on a cheap cassette deck with low batteries.
	How the ladies resist me remains a mystery, but resist me they do. At this point I can say proudly that I still have only one chin, something George Lucas can't say, despite his millions of dollars. Come to think of it, I would probably rather have the money and the chins than be broke and chinless. It could be worse though, Mike has the huge honker and is as shithouse poor as I am, so why am I complaining?
	Second to newest Valve Ben blows his horn, (Roger somehow managed to not get into ANY pictures). Behind him is the no exit sign leading directly to the bathroom. You gotta love the high class joints, they're what make playing rock and roll the exciting adventure it is. I suppose I could say that Ben here is playing with everything he's got including the bathroom sink, but that would just be stupid, wouldn't it.

Brooks takes time to relax with his megahot girlfriend Becka, who, once she gets past the odor and the odd misshapen dwarf hands will surely want to do a photo shoot with me.

We had just met Brooks briefly one time before this gig, so we were all a little unsure how he'd fit in with the group, but once he took the stage and started randomly shouting "Hey, Pull my finger, no come on, just pull it, PULL MY FINGER!!!" we knew he'd fit right in. No one pulled his finger.
	Oooh shiny. Two of the horn boys blowing their little hearts out. If you look carefully however, you might notice that Steve has missed the mouthpiece of his sax and is blowing into a screw on the side of it. After the gig he was complaining about not being able to hear himself in the monitors, but it wasn't until Greg got the pictures back that we found the reason. Steve has promised to lay off the juice and pay more attention next time.
	Reagan doing her best "I don't hate playing horn, no really, it's ok" smile. It was nice to have Reagan back in form after having been out of the picture for the last few gigs with her pregnancy and post partum recovery. We had hoped to be the only local R&B band to feature live onstage breast feeding, but she wouldn't go for it. Oh, if only my own manboobs could be made functional, then I'd show them, I'd show them all!!
	Another in the "Greg makes silly self portraits" series, the title of this picture is "Just past half in the bag"
	Here he does it with a total stranger. Well, ok, this is Greg's friend Pax, not really a stranger though judging by the look on his face, he wishes he were.

And this is Megan, wife of Rick who worked the door, see? If you come to a Valves show, you too may be immortalized on the "Internets"

So, what do people do when we are busting our asses onstage? Why, they sit around and eat of course. This appears to be Reagan's posse. I heard Willies had great pizza, but due to my ongoing effort to lose weight I couldn't have any. Oh well, it's all moot now, because soon they will be just another Quick-E-Mart clone selling Teriyaki slim jims and scratch tickets.

And once again, a Valves photo page ends with Ace, Reagan's father, looking like the proverbial deer in the headlights.Not sure what he was doing here, but sure looks guilty of something. Guess we'll never know. Tune in next time for more fun pictures of us as we merrily make music for multitudes of mostly mirthful mavens